The perks of being a teenager
by sherbertbomb
Summary: Jace, Clary, Izzy, Simon, Jordan, Maia, Alec and Magnus are in their final year at Idris High school a small school in the small town of Idris, America. Follow their journey as they experience love, loss and friendship. Can Clary and Jace cross the line from their initial hate into love? Can Simon and Izzy enter into a real relationship? And can Maia and Jordan forget the past?
1. The coffee shop

**So the first chapter of a new fanfic. I hope you enjoy reading it and please review. **  
**Here are a few things worth mentioning before you read the story**  
**- Sebastian isn't evil in this story, he is a part of the group and a nice guy**  
**-Jace's parents are still alive so he does not live with the Lightwoods however he and Alec are best friends and his parent are always away on business so he spends a lot of time living with the Lightwoods**  
**-All of the characters are in their final year of school**  
**Disclaimer (This counts for all of the chapters,) I don't own the mortal instruments, I do own all of the things I make up**  
**Enjoy :) **

Clary loved the smell of coffee, which was fortunate considering she worked in a coffee shop, She had spent most of the holidays waitressing and brewing coffee at the local cafe Java Jones in order to raise money to go towards her collage fund.

She was hoping to attend the New York University of art, a very high end art school that only accepted the best art students.

Clary was hoping to earn a scholarship to be able to afford the tuition fees. As well as waitressing Clary also sold pieces of art at Java Jones and the local gallery, she also taught a Sunday art class for kids.

Another of the perks of working at Java Jones was the free coffee, Clary loved coffee and drank more than her fair share at work but her manager Magnus always turned a blind eye to her caffeine addiction because she in return gave him discounts on her paintings.

She also got to listen to the band that played every Saturday night and sometimes during the week without having to order food to watch them perform.

The downside was having to work whilst they were playing and manuvering through crowds with a tray full of drinks was a dangerous thing to do, especially since Clary was not very co-ordinated. The heels they were forced to wear as part of their uniform did not help matters.

It was a crowded Saturday night in the first week of the holidays and Clary was busy waitressing.

The shop was packed in anticipation for the band that was playing shortly. She had just taken orders from three conservative looking old women who did not fit in with the relaxed, youthful atmosphere of Java Jones when an average sized boy with brown hair and glasses burst through the door carrying a black guitar case.

He stumbled on the mat in the doorway causing his glasses to slide off his nose and onto the floor. In the process of retreiving them he managed to knock over two chairs, a vase full of flowes, a table and a curious toddler who had made the unfortunate decision of standing to close to the boy's swinging guitar case.

The three grandmothers sniffed in disapproval whilst Clary laughed and helped the boy up before pulling him into a hug.

"Hey Simon, nice entrance" she said before picking up the chairs and table that had been knocked over during Simon's embarrasing stumble.

Maia, another waitress hurried over and cleared up the mess caused by the broken vase. Simon cast an apologetic look at the parents of the now bawling toddler who glared at him before leaving. The three old ladies were still staring at him with looks of undisguised disgust on their faces.

"Well that was embarassing," said Simon whose face was now redder than Clary's hair and that was saying something.

"Embarrasing is an understatement," muttered Clary and Simon nodded in agreement.

"Have you seen Izzy? She texted me telling me to get my sexy ass over here early," he said, scouting the cafe for any sign of the tall, ribbon thin girl with lucios black hair and brown eyes that was Izzy Lightwood. Clary bit back a grin, Izzy and Simon had been flirting for months now and the sexual tension between them was choking,

"She's in the back room getting more cups," replied Clary,

"Thanks," muttered Simon as he pushed past her and began to walk towards the back room behind the kitchens, Clary caught his arm preventing him from moving any further. He turned to face her and furrowed his eyebrows in confusion.

"What?" he asked and Clary grinned evily,

"You are going to go back there and you are going to ask Izzy out," Clary almost laughed at the expression on his face,

"What, no she doesn't even like me," Simon stuttered and Clary raised her eyebrows in disbelief

"Doesan't even like you? What do you mean she doesan't even like you, you two have been flitring for months," screetched Clary ignoring the looks beging directed her way from the custormers. Simon shook his head so hard his glasses slipped down his nose.

"No, I'm sure Izzy flirts with heaps of guys, it doesn't mean anything," he stammered, pushing his glasses back up his nose. Clary groaned in frustration,

" I have had to put up with Izzy talking about you ever since you guys first met, it's always Simon this and Simon that, I am not making you ask her out out of kindness. I'm doing this because if I have to listen to her analyse one of your sentences one more time I will explode."

She spoke slowly as if she was explaining something to a particularly stupid child. Simon rolled his eyes but nodded anyway and pushed his guitar case into Clary's arms causing her to stumble back in surprise before tripping over her heels.

She only just saved herself from falling by holding onto the back of a nearby chair. She glared at Simon but he ignored her and went to find Izzy. One of the old ladies cleared her throat,

"Excuse me missy are you going to stand there talking or are you going to do your job and take our order to the kitchen?" She asked whilst the other two scrutinised Clary as if she were something particularly horrible on the bottom of their shoe.

Clary didn't blame them, her short black skirt, loose black shirt and ankle boots with three inch heels did not match their outfits which consisted of ankle length skirts and matching cardigans buttoned up to their necks.

It was a miracle they hadn't melted in the heat, or maybe Dorothy hadn't poured a bucket of water on their heads yet.

Their hair was short and neatly curled whilst Clary's was a fiery red with streaks of green and purple running through the right hand side, she had pulled it back into a messy high ponytail which revealed a eagle tattooed onto the back of her neck and the strings of ivy on her collarbone.

She smiled sweetly before apologising and walking over to the kitchen to deliver their order to Raphael, the head chef.

* * *

Simon cautiously approached the backroom, rehersing possible scenarois in his head.

They all consisted of him making an utter fool of himself whilst Izzy either rejected him, laughed or did both.

Squaring his shoulders he entered the room, the opening door caused Izzy to turn around and she beamed when she saw Simon. They had been flirting for months and she wanted to take things to the next level, but she didn't know if she was ready.

Simon was not the type of guy she usually went for, he wasn't out of this world gorgeous with tanned skin and a six-pack. He was a kind, considerate guy who always put others before himself and had an addiction to gamer shirts.

Izzy knew that he would take a real relationship seriously and that scared her because she was used to having flings and never in her life had she been in a real relationship and she didn't want to mess it up.

"Hey Simon," she said smiling before turning and grabbing some more cups, she already had enough but it gave her a reason to bend over, causing her skirt to hike up her thighs and based on the sound he made Simon had noticed.

"Hey Izzy umm can I ask you something?" his voice sounded strangled so Izzy decided it was time to straighten up,

"Sure," she said trying to make her voice sound casual and uninterested.

"I was wondering if you wanted to go out for dinner tomorrow?" Simon was sure his heart was going to jump out of his chest any second. Izzy felt the same way but they both kept both their voices and movements casual because Izzy was scared of being in a relationship and Simon thought that Izzy was way out of his league.

"As in like a date?" Izzy asked, her voice was uncertain because she had never thought that Simon would actually ask her out, Simon took the uncertainty to be a rejection so he hastily said,

"No, I mean like as friends." In that moment Simon extinguished the possibility of a relationship between them and they both felt a surge of disappointment but neither of them let it show. Izzy forced a smile onto her face.

"Well in that case we should invite the entire gang," Simon hastily agreed, effectively stopping what was sure to be an incredibly awkward dinner between the two of them,

"I have to go and set up so I guess that I will see you later," he muttered before leaving, as soon as he was gone Izzy put her head in her hands and groaned. Little did she know that Simon was doing the exact same thing outside the door,

all this experience had done was cement the awkwardness that had risen between the two of them recently, both of them wanted a relationship but neither of them could voice their feelings for the other so they were stuck in a weird limbo of tentative flirting and delicate emotions.

* * *

By the time Simon had finished his encounter with Izzy the rest of the band had arrived. They consisted of Jordan, one of the lead singers, Alec, the guitarist, Sebastian the drummer and Jace the other lead singer.

Jace was a recent addition to the band so neither Clary or Izzy had met him yet, but he knew what their reactions would be.

Izzy would think Jace was hot but she wouldn't like him as anything more than a non-official older brother and Clary would hate him because of his cocky arrogance.

Simon didn't particularly like Jace, probably because Jace had kindly dubbed him to be 'rat boy' sadly the nickname had caught on, but Jace was a good singer and composer so Simon was willing to tolerate him.

Their band was currently called rock solid panda but knowing the guys it would change within a week, the constant stream of bad names that his band had was the source of a long running joke between Simon and Clary, he though their worst name was sea vegetable conspiracy whilst Clary insisted that Lawn chair crisis was the worst name their band had ever had.

Jordan was setting up his microphone when he saw Maia, one of the waitresses hurry into the kitchen without glancing his way.

He felt a stab of regret as he thought of their past relationship, it was love at first sight between the two of them and for a couple of months they were the happiest teenagers in existence.

That was until they hit troubled waters and unlike some relationships their love didn't stop them from being drowned by the current. Neither Jordan nor Maia discussed the 'incident' as it was called but it hung between them like a mist and neither of them forgot. Their relationship had been smashed on the rocks.

Jordan knew that he had made a mistake but Maia would never let him get close enough to apologise, and even then he didn't know what he would say. Heartbreak couldn't be forgiven and forgotten because of one apology.

Jordan sighed and ran a hand through his hair in frustration before tapping the microphone to see if it was plugged in.

He was rewarded with the amplified sound of his finger hitting the microphone, earning lots of annoyed looks from the customers, especially the three old women who were now delicately sipping coffee and nibbling scones. They were terribly out of place in the crowd of eager teenage girls.

Looking around Jordan tried to locate the other members of the band, Alec was talking to Magnus, the glittery manager of Java Jones, Jordan smiled, they had been dating for a couple of weeks and they were both very happy and Jordan was glad to see Alec with a boyfriend, Alec had never been entirely comfortable with himself being gay.

Simon was fiddling with his guitar but he had a look of deep sadness on his face. Jordan didn't ask him what was wrong because Simon was uncomfortable talking about emotions.

Jace was, as expected, flirting with one of the teenage girls who had come to watch them perform. This particular one was blonde with tight leather short shorts and a low cut lace top. J

ace was not making the slightest effort to keep his eyes above her chest but the girl didn't seem to mind. Sebastian was also talking to a girl but this one was not slutty, she had soft brown hair, leggings and a loose oversized shirt.

"Clary," Jordan called out, recognising the pretty red haired waitress.

Clary and Jordan had been friends since second grade, during the breakup between him and Maia Clary had ignored him like all of his other friends but she had eventually forgiven him.

Clary always gave people second chances. She grinned when she recognised him and he hopped down off the small platform acting as a stage and walked over to her.

"Hey Jordan," she said smiling,

"What's up Clary?" he asked and she rolled her eyes,

"the roof," the both laughed even though the answer was clichéd.

Jace chose that moment to materialise next to them, the blonde girl forgotten.

Jordan inwardly groaned, Jace was a player with a high opinion of himself and Clary was stubborn and hated guys that viewed girls as objects. They would get along about as well as the Nazis and the Jews.

* * *

Jace held out his hand in greeting, inwardly he was estimating how long it would take to get this girl into bed and then how long it would take to get rid of her afterwards. Her eyes quickly swept over his body and he smirked, knowing that any second she would start drooling.

But then she did something surprising, she laughed.

"There is no way I am sleeping with you hot-shot." she said, rolling her eyes and Jace immediately dropped the smirk

"What made you think I would actually want to sleep with you gingerbread?" he said in his best snarky tone and to his surprise she rolled her eyes again,

"Wow, a ginger related food nickname I have not heard that before, please continue creating original nicknames," the sarcasm in her voice could have killed a herd of elephants. Jace was speechless but Jordan laughed,

"Wow, a speechless Jace that only comes once in a blue moon,"

the girl smirked before saying,

"I don't think he has ever had a conversation with an intelligent girl before. I doubt any of the girls he sleeps with could tell the difference between Shakespeare and harry potter,"

Jace felt a flush of anger and decided that he did not like this hot tempered girl,

"Well I wouldn't know they usually have something in their mouths when I'm with them" he said, thrusting his hips to make a point. The girl's face twisted into a look of disgust before she stormed off to take more orders.

"Who the hell was that?" asked Jace and Jordan laughed,

"That my friend was Clary Fray, she works here and is friends with everyone in the band so you will be seeing a lot of her," his tone was full of amusement at the thought of Jace and Clary having to spend extended periods of time together.

Jace was fuming so he went back to the blonde girl he had been talking to earlier, well he had stared at her chest whilst she yabbered on about something. He didn't even know her name and he had no intentions of discovering that piece of information.

He only had time for a quick make-out session before Jordan was calling him up onto stage and they began performing, him and Jordan alternating singing lead and back-up for different songs.

* * *

Clary rushed to find Izzy with the full intent of dissing that golden guy. He was so irritating, when they had first met he had stared at her like she was a piece of meat and he had the nerve to get offended when she talked back to him.

Yes he was hot but the bad thing was he knew that he was and that had boosted his ego to something roughly the size of a small country. She hoped he caught herpes from the next girl he slept with, although that probably wouldn't stop his womanizing ways.

Izzy had still not come out of the back room and Clary wondered what her encounter with Simon had been like, judging from the fact that she hadn't come squealing to her Clary guessed that it had gone badly.

She did not, however, expect to find Izzy sitting on the crying with her face clutched in her hands.

* * *

As soon as Simon had left Izzy had broken down into tears, she didn't know why because she usually never cried but Simon managed to effect her emotions without even meaning to.

He was the first boy to ever reject her and he was also the first boy she wanted to be involved in a romantic relationship with.

The sound of footsteps alerted her to the fact that a person was approaching, the sharp clicks their feet were making combined with the fact that this was a staff only area made Izzy sure that the approaching person was a employee.

Izzy, Clary and Maia were the only three workers at Java Jones and Maia usually retreated to the safety of the kitchen when Jordan was around so Izzy was confident that the person was Clary.

She was correct with her guess and the look on Clary's face told her that she knew what was wrong. They needed no words, instead, Clary just sat down next to her and allowed Izzy to cry onto her shoulder, both lost in the mixture of feelings that come with being a teenager.

**So there is the first chapter. Be sure to follow the story if you want to hear more and favourite it if you liked it. Be sure to review to make me happy and check out my other story, it is called Traumatic experiences and is a mortal instruments fanfic. I'm not sure when I will next update but I will if people want me to continue the story. Until then, bye bye xxx**


	2. A bad day for all

**What's up? here is the next chaper, it is kind of a filler but don't worry next chapter will be better. Thanks to everybody that has reviewed, Lilietje99 asked what songs they would sing. I'm sorry I did not put that into the last chapter and I wasn't going to put it into this one so I will just tell you, I don't imagine them as a heavy metal type band, I imagine them more as something like The script so the songs they sung would have to be**  
**- Secrets and stop and stare, one republic (Jordan would sing) **  
**-Vanilla twilight, Owl city (Jace would sing) **  
**- viva la vida and paradise, coldplay (Jordan would sing) **  
**-for the first time, breakeven and if you ever come back, the script (Jace would sing)**

To say that Clary was having a bad day was an understatement.

It began when she rolled out of bed, not rolled as in that cool, uplifting way people get out of bed in movies as soon as their alarm goes of, Clary actually rolled out of bed whilst attempting to turn of the shrill beeping created by her alarm.

She hit the ground with a sharp thud and became hopelessly tangled in her sheets when she tried to get up. Then to top it all off she somehow caused the alarm clock to fall of the beside table and onto her chest.

The positive to this was that the alarm finally stopped, the negatives were that the alarm clock was broken beyond repair and Clary was winded with an alarm clock shaped bruise on her stomach and a bruise on her hip from where she landed after her fall.

Her day did in no way improve from there, she slipped on her way over to the bathroom and the shower had run out of hot water, a fact she discovered when it turned ice cold whilst she was shampooing her hair,

after enduring the unforgiving coldness of the shower for as little time as possible Clary proceeded to trip once again, this time on the tangled mess of covers she had left on the floor and then she poked herself in the eye, twice. Once with her eyeliner and again with her mascara.

After all of those holdbacks she was in a rush to make it to her art class on time so she chose to forgo breakfast, a fact her rumbling stomach did not forgive her for as she drove to the class.

All of these things did not put her in a good mood but being an optimistic she was willing to put all of the bad incidents of the morning behind her.

She pulled up in the parking lot of an old looking building with peeling paint and a sagging roof, it was a single room rented out to a bunch of different groups from the art group Clary worked for to a yoodling group.

Clary unlocked the door and inhaled the smell of paint, smiling as it succeeded to calm her tense nerves. She decided that this day was not going to be that bad after all. How wrong she was.

She still had about ten minutes until her class arrived so she used that time to set up clean canvases and clean up most of the mess left behind by the class before hers. Satisfied that she had done a sufficient job of setting up Clary sunk into a nearby chair.

And jumped back up again immediately when she realised it had contained a pool of blue paint. Great.

* * *

Jace slipped out of the room as silently as possible so that he didn't wake the person currently asleep on the bed.

Sunlight was seeping in through the gaps in the curtains and he winced as the saw the room properly for the first time. Everything was pink,

pink walls, pink furniture and pink decorations. Jace was now regretting sleeping with the girl he had been flirting with yesterday, sure she was blonde, hot and willing to put out but she was clingy and girly with an incredibly annoying personality.

Jace had no intention of talking to her again and he still did not know her name, it was a good thing she had her own apartment so that he didn't have to deal with angry parents whilst he did the walk of shame.

As he walked onto the street he realised that he had absolutely no idea where he was, Idris was a small town but he had only moved here about a month ago and hadn't made much of an effort to look around.

But he lived in the twenty first century so all he had to do was unlock his iphone and use the map app to find out how far away he was from his house, he decided to walk back past Java Jones so he could get another one of their excellent coffee's.

As long as he didn't have to see that red haired girl again.

After making a couple of wrong turns he saw the small, brick building with a glowing sign announcing it to be Java Jones. It was crowded with teenagers enjoying the freedom given by the holidays.

One particular table outside was crammed with girls wearing too much make-up, short skirts and low cut t-shirts. They all giggled when they saw Jace and he winked at them as his ego was inflated further.

Inside the café was packed and despite the air conditioning it was uncomfortably hot, Jace removed his leather jacket and many of the girls sitting inside began staring at the muscles that were revealed through his t-shirt.

There was only one waitress working the floor and her face was red from exhaustion. Jace took in the caramel coloured skin and deep, brown curls and recognised the girl to be Maia, Jordan's ex, Jordan was still in love with her but as far as Jace knew it was Jordan's fault their relationship had ended.

Jordan didn't like talking about it and nobody else volunteered any information concerning the 'incident'.

Thankfully the red haired girl was absent and so was Izzy, Magnus the manager was making coffees behind the counter looking just as flustered as Maia.

Jace joined the back of the line and waited for what seemed like a millennium until he was at the counter,

"Hey Jace," Magnus said giving him a tired smile, most of his glitter had been worn off and the spikes in his hair were drooping slightly in the heat.

"Hey Mags, why so flustered?" asked Jace, smirking

"Izzy called in sick and Clary is teaching art lessons so she couldn't come in," Magnus said and Jace nodded,

"Can I have a green tea frappe and a chocolate muffin to go?" he asked and Magnus nodded,

"Just go and wait over there for your order," he indicated to a small crowd of people standing near the service area, Jace walked over and occupied his time by flirting with one of the girls that had been sitting outside.

She had long, silky black hair and bright blue eyes, her hair was ruined by all of the products she had smothered into it and her eyes were smeared in make-up that distracted from their clear colour. Eventually Magnus called out his name and he collected his order and left the shop ignoring the piece of paper the girl tried to slip him that undoubtedly had her number written on it .

* * *

Izzy was not sick in the traditional sense but she wanted nothing more than to curl up in a ball and cry, which is exactly what she did.

She did not bother to brush her hair to perfection like she usually did and her face remained pale and make-up free. She was not wearing her usually glamorous outfit with ridiculously high heels, instead she had pulled on a black tank-top and a pair of loose grey sweatpants.

She was currently sitting on her bed surrounded by a pile of tissues and junk food wrappers. At this moment Izzy hated Simon because nobody made her react like this. How could he have raised her hopes and then tore them down? how could he have rejected her?

Izzy had conveniently forgotten that she had asked if they were going as friends causing him to lose his already non existent confidence. She forgot because most of the guys she engaged in a 'relationship' with were confident and cocky and would not let her comment about friendship stop them from asking her out. She did not understand that Simon was just as lacking in confidence as she was.

Izzy desperately needed somebody to talk to so she texted Clary because Clary could always be counted on to provide a shoulder to cry on and be a supportive friend.

Izzy: Hey Clary, can u come over?

Clary: Sure, I am teaching atm and then I need 2 quickly go home and change

Izzy: KK, how long will u be?

Clary: about 15mins

Izzy- kk see u then

With that Izzy pulled herself out of bed in order to grab some chocolate ice cream and a spoon from the kitchen before staking back up to her room and beginning to inhale the creamy goodness. She would have to go on a diet after this, something else Simon could be blamed for.

* * *

A soft knocking at her door made her look up from the ice cream long enough to say,

"Come in,"

the door opened revealing her brother Alec. They could have been identical twins with the same luscious black hair and tanned skin but Alec had clear blue eyes whilst Izzy's were a dark brown. Izzy wished that she had blue eyes because they were so much more intersting then brown ones. Alec paused awkwardly in the door, the were close as siblings but Izzy hardly ever broke down the way she was currently doing and Alec was never sure how to handle the situations.

"Hey, you okay Iz," he asked, coming over to sit on the edge of her bed in a microscopic spot that was not covered with clothes and other random junk.

"Do I look okay?" she asked indicating to her face and then at the food and tissues surrounding her.

"I guess not, do you want to talk about it?" he asked, still perched awkwardly on the very tip of her bed. Izzy shook her head,

"Nah, Clary's coming over in about five minutes, I'll spill my guts to her," she said, the corners of her mouth twitched up into something that was not the frown she had been wearing all day but it could not be classified as a smile either.

"Great," Alec let out a sigh of relief, he hated discussing emotions and was glad that Izzy had a good friend that she could talk to so that he could be saved the emotional trauma of learning about what a guy had done to her in great detail. Izzy always went into painstakingly great detail whilst analysing every single one of her conversations with the guy in question.

Although Alec did not want to hear about what had happened he still had a protective older brother instinct that made him say,

"Do you want me to kick someone's ass?"

Izzy shook her head and Alec nodded before smiling at her and leaving.

He had a date with Magnus so he grabbed his keys and walked out of the house. On his way out he met Clary who was hurrying towards the house wearing a pair of white shorts and a loose purple t-shirt. The shared a quick hug before parting ways, as Clary was entering the house Alec called out to her,

"Good luck with Izzy she is an emotional wreck, you will probably have to spend the night watching crappy movies and then make a vow swearing not to date until you are sixty,"

Clary laughed,

"Nah I will have to swear not to date until I'm eighty,"

They went their separate ways, Alec to meet his 'secret' boyfriend and Clary to comfort the wreck that was Izzy.

* * *

Maia was suffering through the last ten minutes of her shift. Sundays were the worst because it was the busiest day and only her and Izzy were on duty and today Izzy hadn't shown up. She had not had a break all morning and was glad when the initial morning rush wore off. She made herself a caramel coffee and sank into one of the recently vacated seats to drink it in peace.

Another person sank into the seat across from her and Maia wondered if the gods were out to get her today. When she was who the person was she had her answer. yes.

It was Jordan.

He sat opposite her awkwardly and a silence as thick as peanut butter formed between them, Maia decided to wait for Jordan to start a conversation because he was the one who had sat opposite her.

The initial rage she had felt towards him at the end of their relationship had dissolved into a kind of tired acceptance. He was not going to leave her life but that did not mean that she was going to forgive him easily.

The silence stretched out for another seven minutes until Maia realised that Jordan was not going to initiate a conversation, not that Maia wanted one. She just wanted to know what he wanted and then she wanted him to go away.

"What are you doing here?" it came out sharply, more sharply then she had intended it to and she felt a flash of guilt when she saw him wince but then she reminded herself that this was all his fault.

"I.. I don't know," he sounded broken and lost but Maia ignored any pity she felt towards him.

"Well figure it out," they lapsed into another silence as Maia gave Jordan time to collect his thoughts.

"I just want to have you back in my life," he finally said and Maia felt a wave of anger flood over her, he had put her through all of that and now he wanted her back?

" Well I am not going to be your girlfriend again," she spat and prepared to leave when Jordan grabbed her hand.

"No we don't have to be dating I just want you in my life whether we are friends or acquaintances or even enemies I just want you to talk to me," He sounded desperate and Maia, despite her hard shell, was a really nice person so the desperation in his voice helped her reach a decision.

"Fine, we can try again as acquaintances and then maybe move onto being friends, nothing more than that," she replied, keeping her tone cool but not cold. Jordan nodded, his eyes lighting up.

"Okay then I will see you tonight at that dinner everybody is going to," he let go of her hand and walked out of the door, Maia was left sitting alone wondering why her hand felt so cold.

* * *

Clary spent most of the day comforting Izzy, first she told her the story of her bad morning and went into extra detail on how she sat in the puddle of paint and had to teach a class with a massive paint stain on her butt. To make it worse her boss had come in to assess her teaching and he had noticed. It was a good thing he found it funny.

She then cleared away all of the rubbish covering Izzy's bed and made them a healthy lunch of cold chicken salad sandwiches and carrot sticks. After that Izzy was feeling much better and they settled down to watch The notebook. Izzy did not understand how Clary never cried during sad movies whilst Clary did not understand how Izzy could plough through what seemed like thousands of tissues whilst watching sad movies.

When Izzy was all cried out Clary decided it was a good time to bring up the topic of conversation that they had both been avoiding all night,

"Izzy, are you still upset about Simon?" she asked gently, knowing that to push Izzy to hard when she was in her current state would result in tears.

"Yeah, I don't know why it's not like he even did anything except for not wanting me to be his girlfriend." Izzy sighed and ran her hands through her knotted hair,

"Look Izzy Simon really likes you and he told me that he was going to ask you out so did you maybe say anything that might have scared him off?" Clary asked and Izzy considered,

"I don't think so, he asked me out for dinner today and then I asked if he meant a date and he said no as in we go out as friends,"

Clary groaned and put her head in her hands, so that was the reason behind tonight's dinner,

"Izzy he meant as a date but when you aske he thought that you meant you didn't want to go out with him" Clary said, her voice muffled by her hands and Izzy's mouth formed a perfect o as she realised what had happened.

"Well if he didn't tell me how was I supposed to know that he meant a date?" she sounded annoyed

"I don't know but maybe you should ask him out?" Clary suggested tentatively

"No he needs to man up and ask me out. I just need to convince him to do so," Izzy said and a light appeared behind her eyes causing Clary to groan inwardly, Izzy's plans were bad at best and suicidal at worst. There was also no way go talking her out of them so Clary usually went along with them and attempted to keep the amount of damage caused to a minimum.

"I am going to make him jealous," announced Izzy and Clary was surprised about two things, one that Izzy's plan was completely unoriginal and two that there was no way it would work.

"Izzy that will never work, you will date some guy pretending to be happy whilst Simon dates a girl and pretends to be happy and neither of you are willing to admit your feelings until you are both old and wrinkled with about two years left to live," Clary said using logic and reason, two concepts that were apparently foreign to Izzy because she insisted on going ahead with her plan.

"Come on we have to get ready for tonight," She said before running into her bedroom. Clay remained on the couch in the living room, well the positive was that Izzy was feeling better, the negative was that she was about to ruin any chances her and Simon might have had at a relationship.

"Fray get your ass up here now," Izzy called and Clary sighed before pulling herself up and following Izzy to her room.

**So that's that, stay tuned for the next chapter that will feature an incredibly awkward dinner at taki's. Sorry there was no Jace\Clary relations in this chapter, there will be in the next chapter but they will not become 'friendly' for quite a while and then they with take even longer to date. So Jace will remain an ass for a while, what Jordan did to Maia will also be revealed soon but it is quite obvious, an imaginary puppy to everybody who can guess what he did:) remember to review to get me to write faster.**

**Till next time, bye bye. xxxxx**


	3. The unwanted dinner

**Hello, here is the next chapter, I apologise if it is not good but I found it hard to write (writers block) but this is what I came up with. I might have misspelled some of the names so please tell me if I do :) Thanks to everyone that reviewed and followed my story. Hope you guys enjoy :)**

When Clary reached Izzy's room she found her already scrolling through her phone contacts trying to find a suitable guy.

"Got anybody in mind?" asked Clary flopping down onto Izzy's bed as she began flicking through the pages of a random fashion magazine without actually reading any of the articles.

"No, but they have to fit all of my requirements," muttered Izzy, her brow furrowed in concentration as she scrolled down the list,

"What are the requirements?" Clary was resigned to the fact that Izzy was planning on attempting her terrible plan and all Clary could do was keep the resulting damage to a minimum.

"They have to be hot enough to challenge Simon but not too hot so that he does not think he has a chance, they can't be clingy, they have to be good at pretending to be in a relationship, they have to be available, they can't be wussy enough to back out and they can't be anyone you guys know," Izzy ticked each of the criteria off on her hand whilst Clary let out a low whistle. She began secretly hoping that Izzy would not find someone that fit all of the requirements.

"Hmmm, he could be good, no when I tried to break up with him he tried to get me back," Izzy muttered to herself, Clary rolled her eyes and picked up another fashion magazine, she was in the middle of reading an article about celebrity plastic surgery gone wrong when Izzy finally decided on a boy.

"Who is it?" Clary asked, mildly interested to see who managed to meet all of the requirements,

"His name is Meliron, we had casual sex for like two months," Izzy said simply as if they were discussing the weather. She began texting him and her phone chimed signalling a reply almost immediately, Izzy grinned,

"He's in," she was obviously pleased that her plan was going well, Clary just shook her head, wishing that her best friends would realise their feeling for each other and soon.

"Right, time to get ready," Izzy began examining every item of clothing in her wardrobe and pulled a few off their hangers. When she was done there were five different outfits lying on the bed. There was a short purple dress with a black blazer, a flowery summer dress with a light brown leather jacket, a pair of short shorts with a cropped top and a pair of skinny jeans with a oversized jumper,

"Opinions?" Izzy asked, scrutinizing the outfits,

"Well we are going to Taki's so the purple dress is too fancy, you will overheat in that sweater so it is between the dress and the shorts and shirt." Clary said, examining each outfit in turn.

"I agree, I'll wear the dress and you wear the shorts," Izzy decided, grabbing the dress and pulling it on, Clary reluctantly pulled herself off the bed and changed as well. The short shorts showed off her legs well and the cropped top finished just above her bellybutton, showing off her curves nicely.

She finished off the outfit with a pair of white pumps whilst Izzy pulled on a pair of high heeled boots that were the same colour leather as her jacket.

They decided on simple hair and make-up because it was a casual dinner, Clary just applied eyeliner, mascara and foundation whilst Izzy also added bronzer, eye shadow and blush as well as the basics.

Sticking with the theme of simple Clary left her hair down in casual waves, Izzy also decided to leave her hair down so that it hung down her back in a shiny curtain but she also pulled the front part of her hair into a braid before pinning it back from her face.

* * *

Jordan, Jordan, Jordan, the name floated through Maia's head all day but she could not come up with any other thoughts to match the name. How did she feel about him? that was the question.

After the break-up Maia was sure that all of the feelings she had for Jordan were eliminated but after the morning at the café she was not as sure.

At first she had dismissed her thoughts as left over feelings, the had been together since fifth grade and the emotional attachments that came with that sort of relationship did not fade in a couple of months but she had been so sure that she could her over him and move on with her life.

Then he just had to act so nice and desperate and somehow he had managed to worm his way back into the centre of her thoughts.

Jordan, Jordan, Jordan, Maia was concentrating so hard that she forgot that she was straightening her hair and the smell of burning caused by neglecting to remember the fact brought her back to reality. Cursing she removed the straighteners from her hair and assessed the strands for any lasting damage. Thankfully there was none.

She did not even know why she was trying so hard to make herself look presentable, normally she just threw her hair up into a messy ponytail and pulled on the first clothes she saw but tonight she was making an effort to make it look like she was not making an effort, did that even make sense?

So far she had tried on about twenty different outfits and around fifty different hairstyles. Nothing seemed to work, she either looked like she was trying too hard or she looked like she was not trying enough. Why did it have to be this complicated?

Eventually she decided on an outfit, a pair of leather shorts, a loose orange shirt with a low back and a pair of black flats. She straightened her hair and decided to keep her make-up natural.

She was not wearing the shorts because she knew that they dove Jordan crazy and it was only coincidental that his favourite colour on her was orange and that the back of the shirt dipped low enough to reveal the small tattoo of a butterfly on her lower back that Jordan loved. And her hair had nothing to do with the fact that she wore it like that for their first date and there was no way that she kept her make-up natural because Jordan hated it when girls replaced their natural beauty with smears of powder and paste.

All of that was purely coincidental, or so she told herself, as she double checked her lip-gloss, applied some perfume and grabbed her bag before walking out of the door. And she had totally forgotten that the perfume she had just put on was Jordan's favourite.

* * *

Jace cursed as he glanced at his watch, he was late.

It was not his fault of course, the blame all lay on the blonde bimbo he was bringing tonight. Her name was Kealie or Kelsey or something, he was sure that it started with a K.

She kept him waiting for twenty minutes when she decided to change her outfit at last minute. Sure he appreciated the shortness of her baby blue dress and yes the neck was low enough to reveal a lot of amazing cleavage but he could get all of that off any girl he wanted and none of them would keep him waiting.

When she realised that she had forgotten her purse he considered dumping her right then, she wasn't even buying her own food the purse just went nicely with her dress.

They were fifteen minutes late when she finally deemed herself fit for being seen in public and Jace had to speed to make it to Taki's on time.

From the outside it appeared to be a rundown building with a sagging roof and bars covering the windows, on the inside it appeared to be a regular diner with squashy red leather seats that stuck to your skin in the summer and scratched tables. But the food was out of this world.

Kealie seemed to take an eternity wobbling across the car park in her high heels but when Jace suggested that she should take them off the looked at him like he's just announced that he thought her grandmother was hot.

When the finally reached Taki's everybody else was seated at two tables that had been pushed together to provide enough seats for everybody. Just by looking at them Jace realised that nobody wanted to be there.

Clary was fidgeting with her hair and making awkward conversation with Jordan who was too busy staring at Maia to reply properly. Maia was sitting opposite him and despite the fact that she was facing Simon her gaze was fixed directly on Jordan and Simon was not any better, he was staring longingly at Izzy who was flirting with the boy sitting next to her, but Jace could tell that she was really staring at Simon and the smile plastered on her face was fake. The only two people that looked happy were Sebastian and Jonathan, Sebastian was talking animatedly to the brown haired girl he had been with the other day, Jace thought her name was Chloe whilst Jonathan was engrossed in a game on his ipod.

Alec and Magnus had cancelled, something about a dentist appointment but Jace knew for a fact that they had gone clubbing.

Jace rolled his eyes and sat down before grudgingly moving over to make room for Kealie who decided it would be appropriate to attach herself to his arm like some sort of leech. Normally he would be enjoying the feeling of her body pressed against him but after the hassle she caused getting there he was not in the mood.

"Not now," he grumbled, pulling himself from her clutches.

"But Jacey Wacey," she wined and Jace winced at her choice of nickname. Clary who was sitting next to him snorted, she had abandoned her conversation with Jordan and decided to interrupt his,

"Problem red?" he drawled, hoping that the red-haired related nickname would irritate her. Instead of being angry she just snorted again,

"Sure I have never heard that nickname before," she was winding a piece of red hair around her finger and normally Jace would consider it a flirtatious action but she seemed to be doing it subconsciously. It was quite distracting the way her hair shined and he never realised what a pretty colour it was. He shook his head as if to remove the thoughts and replied,

"Well you weren't worth the effort of being original," he teased, but once again his comment got no reaction,

"Or maybe you just don't have the brain cells to come up with an original insulting nickname BBSD," she said, imitating his laid back voice.

"What does BBSD mean?" he asked but she just tapped the side of her nose. Jace could not think of a scathing reply, nor could he think of an insulting nickname so he just turned to Kealie and began kissing her. She joined in eagerly but truth be told she was a terrible kisser and Jace was too distracted thinking of a nickname for Clary.

The redhead just rolled her eyes and pulled a novel out of her bag before beginning to read.

* * *

Simon was miserable. He had spent the entire day shut in his room playing his music on top volume whilst constantly reminding himself of how much of an idiot he was.

First he had asked Izzy out but she had been quick to reject the idea of a date, suggesting instead that they went as friends. Now she had turned up with an impossibly hot guy on her arm and had spent the night flirting and laughing. The message she was trying to convey was clear.

She had absolutely no romantic feelings for him what so ever.

Simon felt guilty for ignoring Maia's attempts at conversation but she seemed distracted as well. Clary was reading and neither Sebastian or Jonathan were available.

Sebastian was off in his own world with Chloe whilst Jonathan was playing on his ipod. Simon suspected he was on angry birds because he kept on muttering

"Kill that pig, kill that pig," either that or he was really into some sort of farming program.

But Simon was not interested in any of them. He was only interested in Izzy. He had liked her from the moment they met but had accepted that she only viewed guys like him as friends but then she began flirting with him. How could he have thought that he actually had a chance?

"Stupid," he muttered to himself loudly causing Jonathan too look up,

"What?" he asked,

"Nothing," Simon grumbled, Jonathan nodded and went back to his game.

"Here I come bastards," he mumbled to himself as he swiped the screen and Simon almost smiled. Then he remembered Izzy.

He was so distracted that when the waitress came he ordered the first things he saw without paying attention to what he was actually getting. Clary shot him a strange look that puzzled him until the waitress returned with their orders.

Simon had a Steak and bacon sandwich with beer battered fries and a banana milkshake. Now Simon understood the strange look.

He was a vegetarian and was also severely allergic to banana.

**So that concludes this chapter. **  
**Please post a review and also try to guess what BBSD means and also try to guess what nickname Jace comes up with for Clary. I am trying to be original so I am staying away from stuff like Little red, Strawberry shortcake etc. **  
**Stay tuned for the next chapter which will be split into three mini chapters**  
**-Double dating**  
**- If you can't get her join her**  
**- Acquaintances, friends or more?**  
**Till next time, bye xxx**


	4. Three important incidents

**So here is the next chapter, sorry it took so long my computer kept deleting my work. Thanks to everybody that followed, favourited and reviewed, really please review you guys have no idea how much it means to me. **

* * *

**So instead of writing a heap of filler chapters about the holidays I decided to make one chapter and split it into three different parts, each part is something important that happens to each couple during the holidays so that I can write the next chapter at the start of the school year :)  
Double date happened a week after the dinner at Taki's  
If you can't have her, join her happens the day after the dinner  
Acquaintances, friends or more? happens five weeks after the dinner **

* * *

**Double date**

"Hi, my name is Clary and I will be your waitress for tonight, are you ready to order drinks?" Clary asked in her best chirpy voice, she was currently serving a family of four consisting of two tired looking parents, a crying toddler and a teenaged boy who looked around fifteen and was eyeing her like she was a piece of meat.

"Yeah I will have you on a plate," the boy said winking and Clary rolled her eyes, his parents were too busy attempting to stop the toddler from crying to notice his horrible behaviour.

"How about a juice box?" she asked drawing attention to his young age and the boy huffed, crossing his arms over his chest. His parents finally realised that she was there and muttered that they were not ready to order and asked if she could come back later before returning their attention to the toddler. Clary smiled politely before going to take other orders.

"Oy Waitress," yelled an arrogant voice that Clary, sadly, recognised. She turned to find Jace standing in the doorway with a pretty brown haired girl in an unnaturally short skirt and a shirt that allowed her boobs to almost pop out of the top. Clary raised an eyebrow when she realised that it was a different girl to the one he had been with the other week.

Grudgingly she walked slowly over to them, ignoring the smirk on his face and the way his 'date's' eyes burned into her as if the girl was trying to deicide if she was a threat or not. The girl put a hand possessively on Jace's shoulder, her talon like fingernails digging into his shirt. Clary smirked when he winced.

"What?" she asked curtly and the girl raised her eyebrows,

"You should be polite to customers because you have to do what we say." Her voice was unnaturally high pitched as if she had been inhaling helium.

"I thought slavery was demolished," retorted Clary and the girl's eyebrows disappeared into her hairline,

"But you work here," her voice had become even more high-pitched and Clary winced at the sound, so did Jace.

"Look baby let me sort this out," he muttered to her,

"Baby?" Clary snorted and the girl's face twisted in rage,

"Yes, he calls me baby, it is a compliment," she screeched and Clary had to raise a hand to cover her ear, her voice was that high pitched,

"Sure if you consider being compared to a squealing new-born a compliment," Clary replied

"You are just jealous," the girl stuttered, coming up with clever comebacks was really not her strong point,

"Jealous, please, he calls you that because he can't remember your name," Clary almost laughed out loud at the guilty look on Jace's face, the girl however did not see his expression because she was too busy shooting Clary the evil eye.

"Jace knows my name, don't you honey,"

Jace shuffled awkwardly

"Umm yeah, it's Alice, no wait Amy, hang on Aline, that's it Aline," he said with a proud expression on his face and now Clary did laugh,

"Third time lucky," she said in between giggles, the girl looked ready to murder her on the spot so Jace interjected.

"We need a table,"

Clary stared at him in disbelief

"You wasted my time just to ask for a table? this is bloody Java Jones not a five star restaurant you sit wherever you want," she said, attempting to remain calm and doing a fairly good job of doing so, but she turned on heel and walked away before she could do something stupid like slap that stupid smirk of Jace's face.

She had just taken the orders for the family of four (with unnecessary flirtatious comments from that stupid boy) when the door chimed again. When Clary saw who it was she almost dropped the tray full of glasses she was holding. It was Jace, with the blonde from the other night.

Clary looked around the restaurant and saw Aline sitting alone, texting on her phone. Jace led Kaelie to a table on the opposite side of the café and sat down with her. Clary stormed over, she might not like Aline or Kaelie but Jace had absolutely no right to cheat on either girl.

"Hey Jace," she said stopping at his table, he visibly paled. Clary allowed herself one smirk before she turned to face his other date.

"Hey Kaelie, I'm Clary we met the other night," she said in an overly sweet voice

"Hi" the blonde girl said brightly, but she clearly wanted Clary to leave so she could get back to her date with Jace.

"Jace your other date is looking for you." Clary said loudly enough for Aline to hear. Both girls snapped their heads up and narrowed their eyes at Jace, Clary noticed that Kaelie seemed more annoyed at Aline then Jace though.

Aline, on the other hand, stormed over and began screaming at Jace,

"What the hell, you invite me on a date and then have the nerve to cheat on me with some other girl, we are through Jace" she screamed, Clary noticed that her voice was a lot less high pitched now as if she had been putting on an act before. Aline grabbed one of the drinks from Clary's tray and poured the contents on Jace's head.

Kealie stood up and left without a word, but she was glaring at Aline not Jace as she left.

Jace was left frozen in surprise with soft drink dripping from his hair and a satisfied looking Clary laughing at him.

* * *

**If you can't get her, join her.**

Simon had passed the stage of overwhelming sadness, now he was at the stage of overwhelming anger. How could Izzy do that to him?

He hated her, but she hated the fact that he could not hate her more. No matter how he looked at the situation he could not see what Izzy had done wrong. True it was because in his eyes she could no wrong but that did not stop him from being angry.

A side effect of uncontrollable anger is that one tends to make bad decisions due to a lack of judgement and that is precisely what Simon did.

He grabbed his phone and scrolled through his contacts until he found one of his gamer friends, her name was Maddy and she was a year younger than him and was most definitely the nicest person on the planet.

Simon put the phone to his ear and listened to the ringing that signalled his call had gone through. On the tenth ring she answered,

"What's up Simon?"

Simon did not answer but instead cleared his throat

"Hey Maddy, I was wondering if I could maybe ask you for a massive favour?" he asked

"Wow this sounds serious, lets meet a JJ in five minutes and discuss," she said in her usual breezy tone before hanging up, Maddy wasn't one for goodbyes. JJ was her nickname for Java Jone's so Simon reluctantly changed his shirt because the one he had been wearing before was covered in food stains and walked over to meet Maddy.

She was already sitting at a table when he arrived nursing a hot chocolate whilst a steaming cup of coffee sat opposite her. Simon sank into the seat and looked at the coffee,

"Is this for me?" he asked hopefully and Maddy nodded, Simon pulled a five dollar note out of his wallet but Maddy waved it away,

"My treat, so what did you want to talk about," she asked, sipping her drink, Simon fidgeted before replying,

"Iwaswonderingifyouwouldpretendtobemygirlfriendtom akeanothergirljealous," he said quickly and Maddy stared at him in confusion,

"I'm sorry could you repeat that only slower?" she asked teasingly and Simon grimaced.

"I was wondering if you would pretend to be my girlfriend to help me make another girl jealous," he stammered and a slow grin spread over Maddy's face,

"Must be some girl to make the Simon Lewis resort to jealousy tactics," she teased

"Shut up," Simon grumbled,

"So what is her name?" Maddy asked

"Izzy," Simon was beet red and Maddy put a hand on his shoulder reassuringly

"I'll help you get your girl," she said and Simon looked at her in disbelief,

"really?" he asked

"Sure, why not?" She replied and he grinned

"Thanks Mads I owe you," he hugged her

"Yeah you do," she said before walking out of the café. Simon leaned back in his chair, immensely pleased with himself. He was so immersed in his thoughts that he topped over in surprise when somebody else sat opposite him.

"Ow" he grumbled pulling himself up off the floor and glaring accusingly at the person, who just so happened to be Clary. Simon winced, he had forgotten that she was working today.

"What the hell Simon?" she asked and judging by the accusing look on her face Simon guessed that she had heard his conversation with Maddy.

"Look Clary I know you don't approve of this but I want to prove to Izzy that I have no romantic feelings for her." He said sitting back in his chair.

"But you do have romantic feelings for her," Clary pointed out

"But she does not need to know that," Simon argued and Clary rolled her eyes up to heaven.

"Look Simon I am not going to try to stop you but if you are going to go through with this plan you need to be prepared to deal with the consequences," She said before standing up and leaving Simon sitting alone at the table with an empty cup of coffee and a head full of confused thoughts.

* * *

**Acquaintances, friends or more?**

Jordan made his way over to Java Jones to meet Maia, not that she knew that they were in fact meeting but she was working as the waitress today and it happened to be purely coincidental that Jordan was going there in the last ten minutes of her shift.

It had also been purely by chance that he had done the same thing for five weeks in a row.

But who could blame him? Maia was usually nursing a drink, relaxing in the final minutes of her shift, when he entered and ordered a coffee. He then sat opposite her and they talked, it was nice talking again. After the third meeting they had decided to try being friends an although that wasn't what Jordan wanted he was willing to wait for her, no matter how long it took he would be waiting even if the was on death's door, even if she never returned his feelings.

For as long as Jordan was alive on this Earth he would wait for Maia and if there was a life afterwards he would wait for her then.

He strode into the shop and Magnus began preparing his coffee as soon as he set a foot on the welcome mat. He tossed a ten dollar note onto the counter and muttered

"Keep the change," before going to wait for his drink. Magnus flashed him a quick smile as he stored the money in the till and then he quickly finished Jordan's drink.

Jordan clasped his hands around the warm cup and sat opposite Maia, she smiled and his heart stuttered.

"Hey Mai's," he said, using the nickname he invented when they were dating, Maia frowned for a moment but then her face cleared and the emotion vanished, but even so Jordan made a mental note to avoid the nickname,

"Hey," she grumbled and looked down into the depths of her empty mug.

"What's got you down?" Jordan asked, concerned because he hated seeing Maia upset

"Nothing," Maia said, although it was obviously something,

"Come on, you can tell me," Jordan pressed and Maia sighed,

"It's just some boy asked me out and I said I couldn't go out with him because I was going to the movies with a friend," she explained and Jordan stared at her, not comprehending why she would feel bad because of that, Maia rolled her eyes and explained  
"He works there and when I don't show he will know that I lied."

"Go with me then," Jordan said, surprising both himself and Maia

"What?" she asked and he shrugged

"Well we are friends so we can go together and you won't be lying to him," he explained and Maia considered,

"Sure, let me just go and get changed out of my uniform," she stood up and walked over to the back of the café, pausing for a moment to talk to Magnus.

Jordan drank the rest of his coffee while he waited for her, she did not take long because Maia was not the type of girl to put a lot of effort into her appearance, she was naturally beautiful although she didn't know it. She just had a short attention span and could never be bothered spending time picking out an outfit.

She had exchanged the short skirt, heels and t-shirt that made up her uniform to a pair of leather leggings and a red gamer shirt with a picture of some dice on it and the words 'Chose your weapon," printed at the bottom. She looked perfect.

They walked to the cinema in a companionable silence. Their hands occasionally brushed lightly and when that happened Jordan felt tingles of electricity shoot up his arm, he wondered if Maia felt the same thing. He doubted it.

The cinema was a small brick building with a glowing blue sign stuck on the entrance proclaiming it to be "Idris cinema," Jordan doubted that they could have come up with a more un-original name if they'd tried.

They decided to go and see a movie called 'Mortal Instruments," which Maia insisted was fantastic. Since there was nothing else on Jordan agreed and they bought tickets and even splurged on some overpriced popcorn and drinks from the candy counter.

There was a skinny, pale boy with curly blonde hair ripping tickets and he waved enthusiastically the moment he saw Maia. She grimaced and reluctantly walked over to him,

"Hey fancy seeing you here," he said as he grabbed Jordan's ticket and ripped it, his eyes never leaving Maia.

"I said I was coming, this is my friend Jordan." Maia said in a tone that was less than friendly, waving a hand in Jordan's direction. Joran crossed his arms and did his best to look intimidating, it worked and the boy went even paler (Jordan didn't know if that was humanly possible but the boy managed it,) and gulped, but he pressed on bravely.

"Do you want to go out for coffee today?" he asked Maia who went pale and spluttered

"Umm sorry I have work today," technically it wasn't a lie, she did have work today she just didn't mention that she had already finished her shift. The boys smile left his face and he visibly deflated but he let them pass and they walked into the theatre.

"What's his name?" Jordan muttered to Maia and she shrugged

"No idea."

Jordan enjoyed the movie, probably due to the fact that he could watch Maia out of the corner of his eye and nobody would notice, another highlight was when their hands brushed when they were both reaching for the popcorn.

After the movie they walked back to Java Jones because Maia had parked her car there, they stood in an awkward silence for a minute as they both wracked their brains for something to say.

"So that was fun we should do it again some time," Maia said and Jordan smiled

"Sure that would be fun," the silence began again until Maia once again broke it

"Well I should be going," she muttered and Jordan nodded

"See you then,"

" Yeah bye," she replied and turned to leave but at the last second she turned back to him, stood on her tiptoes and planted a quick kiss on his cheek before blushing and hurrying away.

Jordan remained, he reached up a hand and brushed his fingers against the place Maia had kissed, it now felt cold without the warmth of her lips. He told himself that it was a gesture of friendship but even so he remained still for quite some time with a turmoil of confused thoughts running through his brain.

**So there you go, I hope you enjoyed the chapter and be sure to review to make me smile and encourage me to write faster :) **

**till next time xxxxx**


	5. Morning routines

**So here is the next chapter, sorry not much happens because it is focusing on their morning routines before school starts but it reveals a lot about their individual characters so it was necessary to add to the story. **

**SOME IMPORTANT ANNOUNMENTS (THEY ARE SO IMPORTANT THAT I AM USING CAPS LOCK TO WRITE THE HEADING)**  
**First thing, I have written that Jace moved to Idris at the start of the holidays and some of you might also notice that he is good friends with the Lightwoods which sounds unrealistic because he only just met them. WRONG. Jace has know the Lightwoods since he was a little boy, they are family friends and although the couldn't meet in person very often they still kept in contact.**

**Second thing. I changed the name of the high school from St Xavier's to Idris high. Don't ask me why I just did.**

* * *

**Now the final and most important notice- I hate clichés. This is very relevant because of a few things.**

** One- many of the Clace stories I read on fancfiction follow the following storyline- Jace and Clary hate each other, then they fall in love and then Jace cheats on her with the slutty cheerleader, they argue and then they get back together. **

**None of the relationships in this story are like that. I have nothing against those sort of plots but I want this story to be realistic because it is not just about the relationships, it is about overcoming real teenage issues. So there will be no stalkers, kidnappings, psychotic creeps etc. That also means that Jace and Clary will not begin dating any time soon, sorry :( **

**I also try to avoid clichés with nicknames, so I don't use stuff like goldilocks as a nickname for Jace**

**Now finally I know how Izzy and Simon making each other jealous would not actually happen in real life in a real relationship but it is necessary for the plot and overcoming problems so it does need to be included.**

* * *

If you looked up popular in the dictionary here is the definition you would get  
popular- to be regarded with favour, approval, or affection by people in general.

By this definition Clary, Izzy, Simon, Maia, Jonathan, Sebastian, Alec and Magnus would be the 'popular people in the school.'

However if you want to base popularity on the stereotypes typically found in bad fanfiction then the popular crowd would consist of the following

Kaelie, Aline (although there was a rumour spreading around that she was not talking to Kaelie after the Jace date incident, something that would get her kicked out of the group because Kaelie is the 'queen bee'), Ryan, Jake, Missy and now (most likely) Jace although he had not started school yet.

Group A of popular people type a (based on the definition found in the dictionary) was made up of a variety of different types of people from beauty queens (Izzy) to nerds (Simon) to art freaks (Clary) to glittery gays (Magnus) to reserved gays (Alec) to music lovers (Maia) to football players (Jonathan).

Group B of popular people (the stereotypical crowd) were mainly stuck up cheerleaders and football players.

But those are all ridiculous stereotypes, in reality there was no 'popular' group in Idris High school (wow, another original name) because most people were to preoccupied in their lives to worship one particular crowd of people. There were not the strict cliché groups as found in high school musical but lots of different friendship groups made up of a variety of different people.

It is high school, not some stupid teen movie so there are not strict rules about who sits with who at lunch, there are no 'queen bees' and nobody breaks out into song somehow the entire population of the school knows the lyrics and choreography.

That being said there are some stereotypes that need to be filled  
Bitchy cheerleader- that spot goes to Aline who would be the 'bitch' of the school whether or not she did cheerleading, she was under the impression that being on the team added to her 'reputation', that and she got to parade around all day wearing the short cheerleading uniform.

Hot playboy- that is currently Jonathan, Sebastian used to be along side him but now he is completely whipped and ridiculously happy in a long term relationship. Jace, however, will be joining the ranks of playboys because of his amazingly good looks, (yet another stereotype people- hot guy, heartbreaker, big ego goes through girls like he goes through underwear, although he might change girls more often)

* * *

Morning routines can be used to define a person, if you know somebody's morning routine then you have vital information regarding their personality. What people do to prepare for a day under the spotlight that is the first day back of their final year of high school can really define them.

* * *

School stared at 8 so Izzy woke up at 6 in order to give herself enough time to prepare. Most people thought she did this because she enjoyed getting envious looks from other girls and lust filled stares from boys but it was quite the opposite, she needed the envious feelings and drooling boys to boost her low self-confidence. That's right people Izzy Lightwood, the hottest girl at school had self-esteem issues.

These issues probably stemmed from the fact that she was considered hot. Not pretty, not beautiful, hot. Boys used adjectives like beautiful to describe somebody they would fall in love with, get married and make babies, they used the word hot to describe somebody they would have a one night stand with and then ignore them the next day, and this happened to Izzy all to often.

She used her beauty like a shield and hid behind it, too scared to lower her defences. That was why she liked Simon because he did not care what she looked like, she could be wearing an old shirt and sweatpants and still look beautiful to him. And whilst she liked that feeling it scared her too, because without her looks what was she? just Izzy Lightwood.

So while she received envious looks from majority of the female population she cast envious looks at people like Clary and Maia, girls that were defined by something other then their looks.

When people thought of Maia they thought of a badass girl that could take care of herself and look good whilst doing it and when they thought of Clary they would think of a girl with a temper to match her hair, somebody who is not afraid of shouting their opinion to the world but who is also sensitive and kind and would happily spend the day sketching.

Izzy was a pretty face and that's all she would ever be because she was too scared to be anything else, so she hid behind her shield and accepted the empty compliments given to her every day.

First she showered, using her favourite vanilla flavoured shampoo and conditioner. Then she wrapped her body in a towel and blow dried her hair until it hung in a straight, glossy curtain down her shoulders. Then she picked out an outfit that would show off her figure (a short floral skirt with a cream tank top tucked in) and then she chose the highest heels she could find (a pair of brown wedges) and added the necessary accessories.

Once she was finished with her outfit she moved on to her make-up, first she wiped out all of her features with foundation before bringing them back out and enhancing them so that her eyes looked big, dark and mysterious with long lashes, her cheekbones stood out from her cheeks that were covered in just the right amount of blush and her lips were a deep, cherry red colour.

As she gazed at her reflection in the mirror the only though in her mind was the she wished she could have slept in.

* * *

Jace rolled out of bed at 7, groaning as the light pierced his eyes, it was his first day at his new school but he had already established a playboy reputation.

Jace was scared of committing to a real relationship because he watched his parent's marriage fall apart until neither of them were ever home and he spent more time at Alec and Izzy's then at his real house. To Jace, a committed relationship meant a lot of hard work for a lot of heartbreak and he wasn't willing to make the sacrifice.

He pulled his body up and stepped into his shower, ignoring the fact that the water was ice cold and concentrated on preparing for the day ahead.

He wrapped a towel around his hips and let the air dry his hair as he pulled on come clothes, loose ripped skinny jeans that hung half way down his legs revealing his Calvin Klein underwear to the world (and the female population of Idris High.) He also pulled on a blue t-shirt that hugged his muscles.

Jace ran a hand through his hair to get the 'I just fuck*d your sister on the back of my motorbike whilst speeding away from the cops for robbing a bank' look. He pulled it off well if he did say so himself.

Jace winked at his reflection as he grabbed his toothbrush and his reflection (thankfully) winked back. Jace narrowed his eyes at his chipped front tooth as the brushed his teeth, it was his only flaw but he made it look hot by telling girls it was from when he drove his dad's convertible into a police station.

The girls lapped the story up but in reality Jace got it from crashing Izzy's bike into a barbie house when he was ten. Yep badass Jace Herondale had chipped his tooth on a doll's house whilst riding a bright pink girls' bike, complete with woven pink basked and fluoro pink streamers emerging from both handles.

If that story got out his reputation would be ruined.

Jace's thoughts began to stray, as they often did, to girls. Jace knew his type, he liked slutty girls who would put out and not look for a long term (or any sort) of commitment, but he kept thinking of Clary. She infuriated him but he enjoyed their banter and the way her eyes would narrow and her nose would wrinkle when she was mad. And he could not for the life of him figure out what BBSD meant.

Shaking his head to clear his thoughts Jace walked down to the kitchen with a rumbling stomach and saw the note taped to the fridge, it was messily written as if the author had been in a rush out of the door, knowing his family they probably had. He picked it up and read it

Hey J,  
Your mother and I will be out of town for the week.  
I have a conference and she has an exhibition  
Stay with the Lightwoods if you want to  
xx

Jace suddenly lost his appetite.

* * *

Maia was not one for fussing over make-up. She hated dressing up in flimsy skirts and low cut t-shirts to please the opposite sex. In her opinion if a guy did not notice her until she showed off her cleavage and covered her face in make-up then he could go and screw himself.

She had to press snooze on her alarm three times before the actually managed to open her eyes, then there was the difficult task of sitting up before she could even get out of bed, Maia suddenly became aware of how cold the room was in comparison to her covers.

Her comfy bunny slippers that had been a gift from her grandmother on her tenth birthday were sitting next to her bed and Maia tentatively slid her feet into them before standing up.

If there was one thing anyone needed to know about Maia it was the fact that she hated mornings with a passion, Jordan had used to joke that if Maia had the option she would never have risen out of bed.

She felt a twinge in her heart when she thought of Jordan but she passed it off as hunger. Maia didn't bother getting in the shower, she was late enough as it was. Instead she pulled a brush though her hair before restraining it behind a red bandanna. She then pulled on a pair of black skinny jeans and a red tank top before finishing with her matching studded leather jacket and boots.

She did not bother to apply any make-up, even leaving the pimple forming on the base of her nose bare, if a somebody found her natural face unattractive they could go stuff themselves because Maia didn't give a damn.

It was funny how the tough girls were always the ones that were scared of getting hurt and Maia had been hurt before and she had no intentions of letting it happen again. Despite her hard appearance Maia was a soft person at heart and she was quick to trust and easy to hurt and Maia was always the one getting hurt. Not this year she decided, this year she would make her emotions match her appearance.

This year Maia swore that she would not give a rat's furry ass.

* * *

Clary disliked school, not because of the students, not because of the work and not because of the early mornings. Clary disliked school because the bells, strict timetables, locked doors and metal gates all reminded her of jail.

When Clary was at school she felt trapped, she loved being free to do what she wanted and in her case it would be to sketch all day stopping only to eat. Routines were another thing Clary disliked and school was one big routine.

So the fact that Clary didn't like being told what to do and when to do it also led her into a lot of trouble. Because teachers expected her to do what she was told when she was told to do it and Clary always felt is was necessary to give her opinion, not out of rudeness or anything but purely because if she thought that she disagreed then she should be allowed to disagree. It was a free country.

But teachers tended to disagree with her, something about undermining their authority. And when they felt offended they considered it necessary to give her detentions which she felt it necessary to ignore which led to a whole cycle of arguments, they could not even expel her because she was the top art student in New York, achieved perfect scores on every test and excelled at cross country running and karate.

Clary had never been one to put much effort into her appearance, she felt jealous of girls like Izzy with cury bodies and long legs but she could never be bothered to actually try. Some called it laziness but she called it 'giving herself more time to sleep so that she could avoid getting up for as long as possible,' (when she told Simon that he had laughed and said that was the definition of laziness, Clary had disagreed but couldn't be bothered to continue the argument)

She quickly showered and pulled her hair into a neat high-ponytail, leaving a couple of strands hanging in her face. She decided on a pair of tight well worn jeans and a checker shirt that she felt open at the front revealing a white tank top and her black high top converse.

She also found time to apply mascara and eyeliner.

Clary loaded her bag up with her school books, sketch book, magna and reading books so that the sides bulged and it weighed about twice the amount it should. Her mother said that she would be a hunchback by the time she was thirty if she carried that weight around every day but Clary said she wouldn't mind as long as she had her overstuffed messenger bag.

She paused quickly to kiss Jocelyn and Luke goodbye before leaving and beginning the short walk to school.

* * *

Jordan woke up well before the sun had risen and went for a run. He loved running in the morning because it was quiet and the crisp air had not yet turned sluggish in summer heat.

Some people liked to run with ipods but Jordan preferred hearing the rhythmic pounding of his feet on the concrete, the whispering of wind in the trees and the faint barking of dogs in the distance.

Call him clichéd but it relaxed him.

He circled his block five times before returning to his small flat, drenched in sweat. He had moved out of his parent's house as soon as was legally possible, not because he hated them or anything but just because Jordan was an independent person who hated relying on others.

He turned the shower on cold and washed away all the dirt on his body. He quickly shaved before walking into his room and pulling on the first items of clothing he found on his floor, they turned out to be a pair of loose jeans and a white t-shirt with an intricate skull pattern.

Jordan had hoped that the run had cleared his mind of thoughts about Maia but all it had done was erode away all of his other thoughts until memories of his times with Maia were the only ones left.

Her smiling face swam across his vision, he saw her laughing at one of his jokes, he saw her smiling on their first date, he saw the surprise on her face when he told her he loved her, the thought of the sound of her voice when she told him that she loved him and finally he thought of the tears in her eyes when she saw him-

Jordan pulled himself out of his thoughts, he had made a mistake with Maia and the best thing he could do was to let her go, if he truly loved her he would let her go.

But he just couldn't bring himself to.

* * *

Simon had been awake all night. That day was the first time he would see Izzy since the dinner at Taki's. Normally they would have met up almost every day but Simon hadn't called her and she hadn't called him. Probably too busy with Meliron, he thought glumly.

What did she even see in that boy anyway? he had more testosterone than brain cells, if that's what Izzy liked in a man he would never stand a chance.

That thought alone made the prospect of facing school a dreaded one. He figured he would do his best to avoid all contact with Izzy whilst still interacting with his other friends, or he could just hang out with Maddy.

Simon still wasn't sure if that had been the right thing to do after his anger had dissipated he considered the situation more thoroughly but he had already started and he couldn't pull out now. Or so he told himself.

But the words of warning Clary had given him still echoed in his head, was he ready to deal with the consequences? he didn't know but when the time came he wouldn't have a choice, he just hoped he didn't do anything that he would come to regret.

He was in desperate need of a shower to revive him from his zombie like state and he turned the shower on full heat, wincing as the water scorched his skin. But he persisted because in the words of Daenerys Stormborn 'Fire cannot kill a dragon'

once he was fully functional and no longer half dead from lack of sleep Simon ruffled through his large collection of t-shirts. Eventually he settled on one that had the words 'Studying: a word derived from the phrase students dying' because it seemed appropriate for their first day back at school.

He also pulled on a pair of threadbare jeans, they were his only pair and had been worn so often that parts of the material were bleached white.

Simon was not the sort of guy that even considered touching his hair in the mornings, instead he left it to dry as he considered the best ways of avoiding the sun his world revolved around, Izzy Lightwood.

* * *

**So there you go, remember to review because I will love you forever if you do and stay tuned for the next chapter which I promise will be more interesting and contain a verbal battle between Clary and Jace. **

**Till next time xxx**


	6. First day blues

**So here is the next chapter, sorry it took so long, my internet is stuffed up. Thanks to everyone who reviewed the last chapter, also a big thank you to everyone who has favourited and followed my story, it means a lot. I have exams in like a week and have not yet started studying so I might not update for a while. I am also working on another story to see if I will end up putting it on fanfiction.**

**Hope you enjoy,**

* * *

Jace sauntered into Idris High as if he owned the place, heads turned to follow him and Jace smirked and winked at a couple of good looking girls who giggled and hid behind their hair. Typical.

The main office was easy to locate, probably due to the sign on the door announcing it to be 'the main office', the secretary, a forty something year old woman flirted shamelessly with him and Jace felt repulsed and slightly nauseous when she leaned forward and gave him a view of her wrinkled cleavage.

"Here you go sweetie," she battered her eyelashes at him and Jace felt the urge to gag, he forced himself to smile thinly over his gritted teeth and the woman giggled, Jace had never before seen an overweight middle aged lady giggle before and he never wanted to see it again.

He sprinted out of the office as soon as was humanly possible, leaving the secretary behind. Only when he reached the safety of the hallway did he examine his timetable and he saw that he had maths first lesson.

He also saw that it was in room C12, which he had no idea how to locate. It was as much a mystery as the loch-ness monster, big foot and the location of his locker.

"Hey baby," a voice that Jace, unfortunately, recognised shrieked and then he was hit by a running object before he had time to dodge.

Kaelie engulfed him in a death grip, pinning his arms to his sides and restricting any movement he would probably have made, she was also slowly suffocating him.

"Can't breathe," he managed to choke out and Kaelie finally got the message and pulled away. She was wearing a cheerleading uniform that looked around two sizes to small and a pair of those ridiculous running shoes in the form of heels.

"Look I know you cheated on me but I forgive you, let's never fight again," she said and moved as if to pull him into another death hold disguised as a hug. Before Jace could either block her or tell her that he had no interest in pursuing a relationship with her a laugh caused Kaelie to retreat from her attack (oh wait sorry, her hug)

"Wow if you hold him any tighter then you guys might actually blend together," a sarcastic voice that Jace recognised as Clary spoke from behind him.

He turned and saw the red headed girl herself standing with her arms crossed and a grin on her face

"Jealous garlic?" he asked, adjusting his face into a sneer

"Two things, first why do you assume that every time somebody makes some sort of negative comment about that they are jealous of you and secondly where the hell did garlic come from?" she asked, wrinkling her nose in annoyance.

"Well to answer your questions I don't assume that people are jealous of me I know they are because nothing about me can be viewed in a negative light and to on you have asked me to give you a nickname that is not traditionally ginger related and garlic is like a sister to ginger only worse so you are the ginger equivalent of garlic," Jace said in a sarcastic drawl,

Clary's reply was cut short by the bell and Jace began to panic as everyone went to class, Kaelie had left some time during his conversation with Clary and soon he would be the only person left in the hall.

Clary must have noticed his panic because her expression softened momentarily

"What class do you have first?" she asked

"Mr Sanders, Maths," he replied and her face scrunched up

"Ugh so do I, come on I'll show you where it is," she sounded resigned and began to walk briskly in the direction of which Jace assumed was the class,

"Can we stop at my locker?" he asked because he still had no idea where it was and his bag was full of books he didn't need

"No, move your ass BBSDA," Clary called and Jace hurried after her

"What's with the A, it used to be BBSD," he asked

"The A is a new addition," was all Clary said and she refused to answer any of his questions until they reached the classroom.

Every other student was seated by the time they arrived and the only two available seats were directly in front of the teachers desk. The teacher himself was a balding man with grey hair, glasses and a horrible tie and he was currently calling the roll.

His eyes narrowed when he saw Clary

"Fray, late again I see what's the reason this time?" he said in an annoyed voice, Clary rolled her eyes and didn't bother to try to hide the action so naturally the teacher saw it and naturally his eyes narrowed

"I was being a good student and showing the new kid to class, he was wondering lost, alone and practically in tears when I found him and being the kind, generous girl I am I stopped to help the damsel in distress," Clary said in an overly dramatic tone earning a few sniggers from the class.

Mr Sander's eyes were now so narrow that they were only slits in his pudgy face.

"Take your seats," he barked "I would give you detention Mrs Fray but you wouldn't show up anyway,"

Jace and Clary took their seats, Mr Sanders treated them to one final glare before he began teaching. Jace continued to puzzle over what BBSDA meant whilst Clary fumed about his new nickname for her. Neither of them spoke all lesson.

* * *

Izzy walked into school hanging off Meliron's arm. She had just given up trying to have a conversation with him because all of his relies were some form of grunt. She had no idea if it was some sort of language or if he was incapable of putting together a proper sentence. Probably the latter.

Heads turned to stare at them as they passed and Izzy swayed her hips for the benefit of the males. They were now all eyeing her as if she was a piece of meat and Izzy felt slightly horrified.

If Simon was here she would have told him so and then he would have made a joke and she would have laughed and the bad thoughts would have flown away.

But she was not with Simon she was with Meliron and all she could say was

"Can you walk me to my locker?"

He grunted in response and Izzy assumed that it was a yes grunt not a no grunt so she began steering him towards her locker. She scanned her crowd of students in the hallway looking for any of her friends, instead of finding Clary or Maia her eyes fell on Simon who was strolling through the other students with his arm around a pretty looking girl.

Izzy felt bile rise in her throat but she was stuck in place, unable to look away. Simon chose that moment to look towards her and their gazes met for a second but then he looked away as if nothing had happened and smiled at something the girl had said.

Izzy slammed her locker shut and stormed away without bothering to say bye to Meliron. She arrived early at her first class and consequently she was the only student in the classroom, even the teacher had not yet arrived.

Izzy took a seat at the back of the class, out of public eye and pulled out The Night Circus, the book she was currently reading. She had finished five chapters when other students began filtering into the class, nobody noticed her and Izzy was satisfied with that, she couldn't tear her thoughts away from Simon.

She might be faking a relationship, but Simon was actually in a committed real relationship whilst she harboured secret romantic feelings for him which he obviously did not return. Life sucked.

Somebody sunk into the seat next to her and emitted a sigh that pretty much summed up all of Izzy's emotions. The person turned out to be Maia and they both exchanged small smiles.

"Bad day?" Maia asked in a tired voice and Izzy nodded

"Hasn't been the highlight of my existence," she said, massaging her temples whilst being careful not to smudge her makeup.

"Tell me about it," Maia muttered, pulling out her books.

"Boy problems?" Izzy asked, Maia was pretty good at dealing with most issues but boys stumped her, probably because she couldn't look up how to fix them in an instruction manual.

"Yeah, it's Jordan," Maia mumbled

"Is he hassling you," Izzy was instantly alert, she wouldn't put it past Jordan, she had never really forgiven him for what he did to Maia.

"No, the exact opposite, he is being too nice," Maia exclaimed and Izzy just stared at her

"How is that a problem?" Izzy asked, confused.

"Because I might be starting to like him again," Maia admitted, blushing a delicate shade of pink

"Maia, you can't do this to yourself again, remember what happened last time," Izzy would never forget the image of Maia's heartbroken face

"I know, be he is so nice and caring and sweet and I just can't get him out of my head," Maia's face melted into a dreamy smile as she thought of Jordan and Izzy realised that there was nothing she could do to stop Maia

"Just be careful, you don't want your heart to get broken again," Izzy cautioned her but she could tell that her words went unheard, Maia was immersed deeply in her thoughts so Izzy once again rested her head in her hands and contemplated what she should do about Simon.

* * *

Simon walked into school with his arm around Maddy was excitedly talking about the upcoming costume party at the comic book store (Idris comics, these names are getting more and more ridiculous), he was not paying much attention because he was too busy looking for Izzy amongst the crowds.

He saw her standing next to her locker with Meliron and they made eye contact for a second and Simon saw the undisguised hurt on her face. He tore his eyes away feeling guilty, Izzy was probably upset that he had left her walk into school on her own and broken their tradition. But she was not alone, Simon thought bitterly. She was with Meliron.

He turned his attention back to Maddy and she was looking at him expectantly as if she had just asked him a question. Simon smiled and nodded,

"I just told you that my grandmother wants me to spend the weekend with her, why the hell are you smiling?" she asked, clearly annoyed. Simon winced,

"Sorry I wasn't paying attention," he admitted guiltily. Maddy's grandmother insisted on spending the weekend with her once every three months. She usually forced Maddy to drink lukewarm tea whilst she attempted to suggest appropriate suitors, she also spent the entire time criticising Maddy's clothes, hobbies, appearance and basically every decision she made.

After many years of trying to live up to her grandmothers expectations Maddy had given up trying to impress her, now she went out of her way to irritate her, hoping that she would stop inviting her round.

This involved temporarily dying her blonde hair electric blue, wearing three earrings in each ear and putting on a fake tattoo. Her grandmother thought it was real, the first time she had seen it she had shouted so much her false teeth had fallen out.

"That mean's I can't go to your gig like a good friend slash fake girlfriend," Maddy sighed

"Don't worry when I'm having fun I will think of you at your grandmothers house and laugh," Simon said in a reassuring voice, Maddy laughed and stuck her tongue out at him. They walked to class together but Simon could not erase the image of Izzy's hurt face from his mind.

* * *

Jordan was gone from floating on cloud nine to crashing face first back to Earth; he had been so sure that he had been making progress with Maia and that she had begun to trust him again,

And then she completely ignored him and his cloud dissolved leaving nothing but thin air to support his feeble hopes, and thin air did absolutely nothing to keep them afloat.

He walked to his first class (chemistry) in a self pitying state of depression. He ignored the greetings shouted at him from friends and acquaintances, instead opting to plug in his earphones and listen to his music on full volume.

The band had a gig that weekend and he needed to decide on a set list, so far all he had was Violet hill by coldplay and he needed at least seven songs to make the show last for an acceptable amount of time.

He wanted to sing songs that reflected his unhappiness but he had already exhausted his repertoire of those during his breakup with Maia, Jonathan and Sebastian had actually threatened to dress him up in a strippers outfit and leave him in the girls' locker room unless he sung some cheerful songs.

The truly horrific part of that story was that Jordan had ignored their threats and had actually ended up in the girls' locker room wearing a slutty French maid costume, complete with make-up, landurae and high heels.

It had been one of the most mortifying experiences of his life but the memory of the event still brought tears of laughter into the eyes of his friends. Jordan would probably be laughing with them but the school principal had come into the locker room to see what the commotion was all about and Jordan still could not look her in the eyes.

"What's wrong mate?" Jonathan asked as Jordan slumped into his seat, Sebastian was too busy staring at Chloe to contribute anything to the conversation.

"Maia," Jordan said in answer and Jonathan nodded sympathetically, Maia was the root of every one of Jordan's problems and if they were girls he would have made Jordan describe his problems in detail, but they were guys so instead he said

"Do you wanna come round my place after school and we can decide on the set list and play call of duty?'

Jordan nodded and they fell into silence, broken only by the faint sounds of Sebastian's drool hitting the desk as he gazed at Chloe.

* * *

Clary drove to Java Jones after school, she was still fuming at Jace, how dare he call her garlic? She ducked into the lady's toilets to pull on her uniform. Once she had deemed herself acceptable she strode out and over to the counter where she was working.

It was quiet, most adults were still at work and most of the students had spent all of their money during the holidays. The door opened and a pretty dark haired girl walked in, Clary realised in surprise that it was Aline. She was no longer wearing the slutty outfit she had worn last night, instead she was wearing a pretty summer dress that stopped just above her knees and her hair fell in natural waves down to her shoulders.

"Hey can I please have a summer lime and lemon refresher?" she asked in a voice that was a lot more natural then the high pitched one she had been using the other night.

"Sure," Clary began putting ice, lemonade, lime juice and mint leaves into the blender.

"You're the waitress from the other night," Aline said, leaning on the counter. Clary nodded

"Yeah, sorry about that," She pressed the blend button and the ingredients mixed together

"No problem, Jace is a dickwad, I'm not surprised he was cheating. Thank god I didn't sleep with him, I would probably have caught some mutant STD," Aline laughed, Clary joined in as she handed her the drink. Aline took it and drank a mouthful.

"If you knew he was horrible why did you even go out with him looking like a stripper?," Clary asked "No offence," she added as an afterthought.

"None taken, I went out with him because my parents would approve, he is popular, rich, hot and male," Aline said bitterly

"Do you want to talk about it?" Clary asked, sensing an underlying issue, Aline sighed

"Well I suppose I should start by telling you that I'm a lesbian," She paused for a moment to see Clary's reaction. Clary nodded

"Okay, so?"

"Well my parents are really devoted Christians and they think it's unnatural. I dated my next door neighbour, her name was Emily. Our families went to the same church. Our parents found out and they went mental. Emily's family moved away and mine threatened to disown me if I didn't date guys during high school. I would normally have left but I have nowhere to go and I'm too young to buy my own place but it's only a year before I can legally move out," She explained sadly

"That sucks," Clary said, Aline nodded

"Yeah It does," she drank another mouthful of her drink

"Does anyone else know?" Clary asked

"No, please don't tell anyone especially those demons who pretend to be my friends," Aline said, looking slightly desperate.

"I won't, if you don't like them why do you hang out with them?"

"I don't know, the rest of the school thinks I'm a skank, I don't have anyone else to hang out with," she said sadly

"You can hang out with me and my friends," Clary said and Aline's face brightened

"Really?"

"Sure, and if you ever need anybody to talk to just come and find me," Clary said, Aline smiled

"Thank, I'll take you up on both of those things, see you round." She said before grabbing her drink and leaving.

* * *

**I hope you enjoyed the chapter, Review and see if you can guess what BBSDA means. Please, please, please review to make me smile because a positive review really boosts my writing confidence. **

**Till next time, xxx**


	7. My type of music

**Hey guys, here is the next chapter I am sorry it took me so long to write. I have included both Sizzy and Clace moments in this chapter for those who were missing them. Also some people are wondering if Clace will ever happen, I promise that it will but it will take a while because they can't go from being enemies to dating in like two seconds. Some things are going to happen to make them trust each other. **

**Also bow down to me peasants, you were right about what the A in BBSDA stands for :) **

* * *

Izzy wished alarm clocks didn't exist, if they didn't she could still be lying in her warm, comfy bed not standing shivering in front of her mirror with nothing but a towel to keep out the cold. She quickly applied a layer of moisturiser before picking out her outfit for the day.

She decided on a black skater skirt, a blue tank top which she tucked into it and her doc martins. She also added a small silver necklace with a silver infinity sign and a black beanie to complete the look, then she spent a good twenty minutes perfecting her make-up to make it look natural.

When she was certain her appearance was picture perfect the walked down the stairs and made her way to the kitchen, Alec and Jace were both already there and were in the middle of devouring plates of bacon, eggs and toast. Izzy's stomach grumbled but she ignored it and walked over to the fruit bowl after studying the contents distastefully she decided on a banana.

"There's three pieces of bacon left if you want them," Alec said but his mouth was stuffed with food so it sounded more like "fhers fhee phieces ofp baphon lepht if you wamph them," Izzy looked over to the pan and saw three perfectly cooked pieces of bacon, her stomach rumbled and her mouth watered but she shook her head

"Nah, I'm not that hungry," she lied and Jace snorted. Izzy glared at him before devouring her banana. Alec swallowed the last mouthful of his breakfast and the three of them left the kitchen and raced to Alec's car.

"Shotgun," Izzy shrieked before running and standing next to the door waiting for Alec to unlock the car, rolling his eyes he did so but before Izzy could open the door Jace pushed her out of the way and climbed into the seat

"Hey," Izzy screamed and Jace laughed

"First in first served,"

Izzy glared at him but she reluctantly climbed into the back seat. When they arrived at school she walked over to her locker and started grabbing the correct books when somebody cleared their throat behind her. Izzy turned around and her stomach twisted when she saw Simon.

"Hey," he said, offering her a quick smile and Izzy's heart fluttered

"Hi," she muttered trying to sound casual

"Can we talk?" he asked awkwardly, running his hand through his hair, Izzy wanted to run her hand through his hair, she wondered if it was as soft as it looked. She pulled her mind away from thoughts about his hair _he does not like you like that _she reminded herself.

"We are talking," she said trying to make a joke, Simon smiled

"Can we be friends again?" he blurted out and Izzy blinked

"We are friends," she said and he shook his head

"We haven't talked in ages, everything is awkward between us and I miss you," he admitted and Izzy smiled

"Yeah we can go back to being friends, I don't know what happened between us," she said but she did know, and she guessed Simon knew as well and he was being a gentleman and not bringing up her feelings towards him, feelings that he did not return.

"Are you coming to the gig on Saturday?" he asked hopefully and Izzy laughed

"Well considering the fact that most of my friends and my brother are in the band combined with the fact that I have a shift on at that time means that yes I will be going," she said and Simon smiled

"Sorry I forgot, do you want to have a coffee after?"

Izzy almost jumped up and down with joy but she reminded herself to stay calm

"Sure that sounds great we can catch up," they grinned at each other

"Well I have to go and meet Maddy but I'll see you around," he said before walking away leaving Izzy standing next to her locker. She felt like she was made of lead, of course Simon would want to go and see his girlfriend, who he had romantic feelings for.

She made herself smile despite the fact that all she wanted to do was curl up and cry, then she walked away to find Meliron.

* * *

Classes passed in a blur and if felt like no time had passed when the bell rang signalling freedom for the day. Jace walked out of the classroom with everyone else as he pulled out his phone and saw that he had a new message from Alec

**Alec- Hey is it okay if Iz take I home, we are going kickboxing after school.**

**Jace- sure, I have practice but I'll walk home after**

**Alec- cool**

Jace slid his phone back into his pocket and walked over to the gym. He quickly changed into his running gear and met Sebastian outside on the field. Jace was a cross country champion, at his old school he had been unbeatable and he was looking forward to continuing his winning streak this year. Sebastian was also a good runner but he had nothing on Jace, nobody did.

"Sup," Sebastian said

"How many people are on the team?" Jace asked, cross country was not the most popular sport and usually teams were quite small.

"Ten, seven boys and three girls," Sebastian replied and Jace nodded

"Anyone else we know?"

"Only Clary," Sebastian said and Jace snorted

"Great, I'm going to kick her ass and wipe that smirk off her face," he declared and Sebastian shot him a funny look

"Don't talk the talk if you can't walk the walk," was all he said before the coach arrived with three girls in tow, one of them was stick skinny with dirty blonde hair and serious acne problems, the other was overweight with a shiny red face. Out of the three of them Clary looked the best in the uniform which consisted of a sports bra and bike shorts.

Many of the guys were checking her out but she ignored them and chatted with the skinny blonde girl. The coach blew his whistle and everybody fell silent.

Coach Grundle was in his mid thirties with a shaved head and tattoos on both arms, he was made entirely of muscle and was well known for making students run laps until they vomited if they caused a distraction during his class.

"Right people, don't think I'm going easy on you because it's the first session back. If you have any dedication you would have trained on your own during the holidays and this year I will work you hard so that when nationals come around I have a winning team. Today we are doing a six kilometre run, so three laps around the school and it is timed. The first person back does five push ups and the second does ten. This continues until the final person back does fifty push ups. Any questions?" he barked and everyone remained silent.

'Great we start on my whistle. Three, two, one," he blew his whistle and Jace sprinted off, he was leading the pack by a good ten meters when a red blur passed him. With a shock Jace realised that it was Clary, she was now five meters in front of him and he pumped his legs to catch up.

When he became level with her she looked at him but otherwise did nothing to acknowledge his presence. He kept pace with her but it was hard, she did not slow down her speed from the initial sprint, after the first lap Jace's lungs were burning and his legs were aching but he kept up with her.

By the end of the second lap he wanted to do nothing other than collapse onto the ground but he forced himself to keep up with her and when he fell behind a little he moved his legs even faster despite the fact that every single muscle in his body had screaming at him to stop and he felt like vomiting.

He looked over at Clary and saw that she was not even red in the face, how was she not tired?

When the third lap came around Jace was seriously considering walking for a little bit and that surprised him, Jace Wayland never stopped. Ever.

There was two hundred meters to go when Clary slowed down, it was a very slight decrease in speed but Jace noticed it and he smiled. Pushing aside his pain he sprinted passing her. He halved the distance to the finish line by half so that he was a mere hundred meters away when Clary started sprinting.

She passed him faster then was humanly possible and finished a good ten meters in front of him where she promptly dropped and did five quick push ups. She had finished by the time he passed the line and collapsed onto his face. He groaned when he realised that he would have to complete ten push ups, he didn't think he was capable of getting up let alone doing anything that required effort.

But he forced himself to complete them, he did them slowly with terrible technique but he did them. Then he pulled himself up into a sitting position and became aware of how dehydrated he was. He cursed himself when he realised that he had left his water bottle at home, it was an incredibly stupid thing to do and now he was facing the consequences.

He was so consumed by his own misery that he didn't notice that somebody had sat down next to him until Clary spoke

"Thirsty?" she asked innocently and Jace jumped in surprise. He turned to face her, she did not appear tired in the least and she was holding two bottles of Gatorade, one of them was half empty whilst the other had not been opened. Jace stared at them longingly and Clary laughed

"Here," she said holding the unopened bottle out to him and Jace wondered if this was some sort of prank, but his thirst overcame his common sense and he took the bottle and drank greedily.

"Thanks," he said when he had drained the contents of the bottle

"No problem I always bring a spare just in case but remember one next time it's stupid to come running without one," she said and Jace nodded. The coach wondered over and stood in front of them

"Good job today you two, and thanks for doing that Fray," he said and Clary smiled

"No problem," before standing up and walking over to the shade to stretch

"Nice work Wayland, you beat your old school record by seven minutes," Coach said and Jace smiled

"Thanks, Clary is super fast I just kept up with her, how much did she beat her personal best by?" he asked curiously and the coach laughed

"Her personal best is five minutes faster then that, I asked her to pace you to help you get a better time" he said before walking off to yell at Sebastian who had just crossed the line and was now flopping like a dead fish on the floor in an attempt to do push ups.

He was surprised at how fast Clary was, nobody had ever beaten Jace that easily before and he didn't like the feeling that came with not winning. At least they would be in separate categories in the competitions.

A burst of thunder crackled through the sky and Jace groaned, he had to walk home in a rain storm. Today was not his day. He decided to start as soon as possible so that he could avoid being in the rain for an extended period of time. Clary was also leaving and they walked in silence to the parking lot.

She unlocked her car and Jace began walking towards the exit

"Are you walking home," Clary called after him and Jace turned around

"Yeah, Alec and Izzy are at kickboxing," he said shrugging and Clary frowned

"It's gonna start raining soon, I'll give you a ride if you want,"

Jace considered for a moment

"That would be great thanks," he admitted and Clary climbed into the car

"Well get in then I don't have all day," she shouted at him and Jace rolled his eyes before striding over to the car.

"Am I dropping you off at Izzy's?" she asked and Jace nodded. Clary leaned forward and turned the radio on, it began playing Made in the USA by Demi Lovato She hummed along happily and Jace frowned

"You like this crap?" he asked in an astonished voice and Clary stopped humming so that she could fix him with a death stare, if looks could kill he would be six feet under.

"Yes it is amazing," she said, if they were not in a car Jace was sure that she would have crossed her arms over her chest and stamped her foot.

"It's terrible, do you have any Iron Maiden?" he asked hopefully and Clary wrinkled her nose

"No that heavy metal stuff sucks," now it was Jace's turn to be offended.

"They do quality music," he defended and Clary had the nerve to laugh

"How can you insult my music taste when you listen to shit like that?" she shouted and Jace shouted back

"I like quality music, the stuff you listen to is not worthy of the title music,"

"At least it's not Justin Bieber," Clary shrieked and Jace had to agree with her on that one.

"How about you make me a CD of your favourite songs and I make you one of mine?" he suggested and Clary nodded

"Fine, bring it to the gig and you will see that the stuff I like is quality compared to the screams you consider to be music,"

Before Jace could reply they pulled up outside Izzy's house and he got out of the car, Clary drove away before he could thank her for the ride, not that he was going to. In the short walk from the road to the door he got soaked and he shuddered to think what would have happened if Clary hadn't given him a ride.

He would probably have drowned.

**So there is the chapter. Be sure to review and tell me what songs Clary and Jace should put on their CD's. Also suggestions for the bands set list for their gig would be welcome. Also I love both Demi Lovato and Iron Maiden, they were the first musicians I thought of. **

**Till next time xxx**


	8. Morning gigs at the coffee shop

**Clary's**  
**Made in the USA, Demi Lovato**  
**Here's to never growing up, Avril Lavigne**  
**The popular song MIKA ft Ariana Grande**  
**Vive la Vida, coldplay**  
**Paradise, Coldplay**  
**better than revenge, Taylor swift**  
**Story of my life One direction**  
**Secrets, One republic**  
**Something I need, One republic**  
**True love, Pink**  
**Try, Pink**  
**Sober, Pink**  
**Thanks for the memories, Fall out boy**  
**The A team, Ed Sheeran**  
**Kiss me, Troye Sivan cover**  
**Everybody, Justice Crew**

**Jace's**  
**Vive la Vida, Coldplay**  
**Highway to hell, AC\DC**  
**Sweet child O'mine**  
**Dirty Diamonds, Alice Cooper**  
**Run to the hills, Iron Maiden**  
**The A team, Ed Sheeran**  
**The trooper, Iron Maiden**  
**Wake me up when September comes, Green Day**  
**(S)aint-Marilyn Manson**  
**Fallen Angel-Poison**  
**The number of the best, Iron maiden**  
**Deeds ot Words-Dropkick Murphys**  
** The Dragon Lies Bleeding-Hammerfall**  
** Freak on a Leash-Korn**  
**My songs know what you did in the dark, fall out boy**  
**Thanks for the memories, fall out boy.  
**

**A MASSIVE THANK YOU TO Winterherz FOR GIVNG ME SONG SUGGESTIONS. ILY.**

**I also changed the day that they would give each other the songs so that I wouldn't have to do a filler chapter.  
This chapter has not been edited so it is probably full of spelling and grammar errors but I will come back and fix it. Sorry if you are a grammar nazi. **

* * *

Waking up at five am on a Saturday morning would probably be considered Satan's favourite torture to almost any other teenager except Clary.

Everybody else found it strange that she despised waking up for school in the morning but loved waking up to go running. But it made sense to Clary because going for a run was something she enjoyed and gave her motivation to get out of bed, going to school however only gave her motivation to go back to sleep.

She quickly changed out of her pyjamas into a green tank top and a pair of bike shorts. She didn't bother brushing her hair because it would only get tangled, she just left in in the braid she had put it in before she went to bed.

Grabbing her ipod she tiptoed out of her room being careful not to wake Jocelyn, unlike Clary she refused to get out of bed before eleven on Saturdays.

Clary quickly inhaled a muesli bar and drank a gulp of water before pulling on her shoes and quietly leaving the house, taking care not to make a sound when she closed the door.

It was still dark outside and her breaths formed little white clouds in the air, Clary smiled, when she was younger she used to pretend that she was a dragon and she had spent hours standing outside exhaling puffs of air.

She put her ipod on shuffle and set off while what hurts the most by cascada sounded through her earphones.

She didn't know how far she ran, she just ran until she was exhausted and then went a bit further. Her face was redder than her hair and her breaths were coming out in gasps when she finished. The sun had come up and was trickling a watery light onto Earth.

People were beginning to wake up, when Clary walked into her house Luke was sitting at the table with two plates of waffles in front of him. Clary's stomach grumbled when she caught sight of the food. Luke smiled at her

"Choc chip waffles with vanilla ice cream and strawberries, you favourite,"

Clary devoured the food in a couple of mouthfuls.

"What's your plan for toady kiddo?" Luke asked, Clary glanced at the clock on the oven. The time read 6.40.

"My shift starts at ten thirty, I'll shower and sleep till like nine," she replied and Luke nodded

"Good plan, you really need that shower I don't know how much more my nostrils can take," he said dramatically and Clary laughed

"Well your wish is my command your majesty," she curtsied before leaving to wash the sweat off her body and collapse into bed.

* * *

The breakfast rush was chaotic, Izzy rushed around holding plates stacked with food while avoiding hitting Clary, Maia or any of the customers. She had already had two close calls, once when the heel of her shoe had gotten caught at the edge of a carpet and once when she and Clary had collided.

Miraculously nothing had yet been spilled, the band had arrived (now called Millennium Lint). The boys had been disappointed when Magnus gave them the morning performance not the afternoon one but Izzy had logically pointed out that the pay was the same and there were probably more customers.

She paused to admire Simon, his head was bent over his guitar and he was fiddling with the strings as he attempted to tune it. She loved the way his soft brown hair fell into his face and how he wrinkled his brow in concentration.

Izzy was so engrossed in watching him that she didn't realise when she slammed into Maia causing her to drop the tray of drinks she had been holding.

Customers shot them both dirty looks as Izzy bent down to help Maia pick the mess up,

"Sorry," she said

"Don't worry about it, I was distracted anyway," Maia said, Izzy followed the direction of her gaze and realised that she was looking at Jordan who was plugging in the microphone.

"Tell me about it," Izzy turned her gaze back to Simon who looked up and made eye contact, they smiled at each other and it was Izzy who looked away from him and back to the mess she had caused. She could feel his gaze on her for a couple more seconds before he finally looked away.

They finished cleaning up the spilled drinks as Jordan walked onto the stage and started singing fall for you by second hand serenade. Izzy nodded her head to the beat as he sang. She spent the rest of the performance waiting tables and when they finished their final song (New Divide, Linkin Park) she joined in the applause given to them, even going to far as to wolf whistle when they bowed.

People began to leave as the excitement of she show wore off and they decided to get on with their days. She wondered around clearing up tables as the band packed up.

She met Simon at one of the tables and sank into the seat opposite him, she felt a feeling of satisfaction when she realised that he had ordered her favourite mixed berry smoothie.

She took a sip and he launched into a story about how his evil chemistry teacher, Mrs Greene, had failed Sebastian on a test because she didn't like his handwriting so in retaliation he had snuck into her classroom, plugged her computer into the projector and logged onto a porn site so when she began to teach her next class her laptop started playing porn.

They talked for a good two hours and Izzy became so immersed in the conversation that she didn't notice when her phone started ringing until Simon pointed it out,

"Are you going to get that?"

she glanced down at the caller ID and frowned when she realised it was Meliron.

"Yeah, I'll just be a second," she muttered before walking to the back of the café for privacy.

"What?" she hissed when after she pressed the accept call button

"Since I am pretending to be your boyfriend you owe me a heap of favours,"

"Yeah, so?" Izzy said through her clenched teeth

"I have a family dinner and my mum keeps trying to set me up with this she-demon from down the street, I need a date,"

"When is it?," Izzy asked

"In half an hour, see you there," he hung up, Izzy swore before walking back to the table.

"Sorry something came up I have to go," she muttered and Simon seemed to deflate before nodding

"okay, see you at school,"

"Yeah," she murmured before walking away.

* * *

After the show Jace went looking for Clary, he found her talking to Jonathan and judging by her body language she was not happy about something.

"But I don't want to spend time with them, they are a bunch of losers," she screeched and Jonathan sighed

"Given the choice I don't think anyone would show up but we have to go," he sighed

"Hey ," Jace said when he neared them

"Sup," Jonathan replied and they bumped fists

"What's got her panties in a twist?" he asked jerking his thumb at Clary who began fuming

"Family reunion next weekend." Jonathan replied and Jace laughed

"Seriously? You were getting that worked up over a family reunion?" he asked Clary who put her hands on her hips

"Is there a reason you came over here, BBSDA?" she hissed and Jace thought it would be best to stop taunting her.

"Yeah. You owe me a CD remember?" he said and Clary calmed down a little bit,

"Yeah, it's in my bag come on I'll go and get it."

Jace followed her to the back of the shop where she reached into her handbag and pulled out a CD. The cover was painted a shimmery black with an intricate pattern of gold musical notes. Written in bold red text were the words 'This is music, not that crap you listen to,"

Jace turned it over and realised that like him she hadn't written the names of any of the songs and had instead left it for him to figure out what they were. He reached into the pocket of his hoodie and handed her the CD he had made, feeling triumphant when she bit back a smile as she saw the front cover.

He had taken a picture of Miley Cyrus naked on a wrecking ball and stuck a picture of his face over hers. The he had written the words 'My taste in music will destroy yours," in permanent marker.

"Thanks," she said

"Yeah," he muttered, she smiled at him before walking away to finish her shift.

* * *

**So this chapter is a little shorter but oh well you have a lot of things to look forward to in the upcoming chapters such as a gathering of friends which includes a game of truth or dare, Izzy at Meliron's family dinner, some Maia and Jordan action (I don't have as much of that as I do Clace and Sizzy because it is not as popular) and Clary and Jonathan's family reunion which will be a major clace moment. SO STAY TUNED.**

**AND BE SURE TO REVIEW, tell me if you made a CD of your favourite music what is one song you would put on there? **

**Till next time xxxx**


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